OK, I am wanting to find a "city" not a town, but a city with lots of job opportunity that is VERY near LOTS of both great ice and rock climbing. Suggestions?

Salt Lake City, although the ice climbing season is relatively short compared to other areas. However, the wealth of rock climbing locally and within the state, plus proximity to other areas for both ice and rock (eg: Tetons, Montana, and Wyoming areas) more or less makes up for that.

I am wanting to find a "city" not a town, but a city with lots of job opportunity

There is no clear definition of city vs town - either by population, locale, or form of government (see the wiki entry), at a population of only 17K and despite the presence of a college, Durango can be a big town/small city/whatever. So it may fit with what the OP is looking for, depending on what "lots of job opportunity" means.

To the OP: what do *you* mean by city? What do you mean by "lots of job opportunity"? What fields? What constitutes "very close" climbing? 15 minutes? 45? 2 hours? You said both rock and ice climbing - does that mean a 50/50 split, or do you tend to do more of one of them? Regarding rock - trad, sport, crag, alpine?

Since I have learned to accept it is not a perfect world I am flexible and wanted to hear what varying types of vertical paradise people have discovered. I prefer a long ice season as it is my favorite, but as seasons really go having some decent rock nearby is a necessity.

I was hoping for Idaho, Wyoming, Utah, Nevada, areas but am open to others.

I was thinking a populace of over 40k as a city-like, but it is not set in stone.

Since I have learned to accept it is not a perfect world I am flexible and wanted to hear what varying types of vertical paradise people have discovered. I prefer a long ice season as it is my favorite, but as seasons really go having some decent rock nearby is a necessity.

I was hoping for Idaho, Wyoming, Utah, Nevada, areas but am open to others.

I was thinking a populace of over 40k as a city-like, but it is not set in stone.

With all of that, I'll reiterate the recommendation for SLC. Regarding ice, while our season is shorter* compared to other areas, many other areas are not a long journey away.

*: we do have ice in the higher elevations where the season is longer, but it's less accessible than many other areas. Getting to it would require snow machine and/or backcountry touring skis, and absolutely solid avalanche/snow safety skills. I don't know any specifics as I stopped ice climbing sometime in the early 80's.

OK, I am wanting to find a "city" not a town, but a city with lots of job opportunity that is VERY near LOTS of both great ice and rock climbing. Suggestions?

What's your education/work experience like?

I have 2 undergrad degrees and have lived and/or worked in over 20 different countries. I tend to work in the Third World most of the time and would like to settle down somewhere that I can climb, hunt and train pointing dogs. I just want to know that even if times are tuff the "city" has enough job opportunity that I could get a job doing something(anything) to keep me afloat while I am working on a new stateside career.

OK, I am wanting to find a "city" not a town, but a city with lots of job opportunity that is VERY near LOTS of both great ice and rock climbing. Suggestions?

What's your education/work experience like?

I have 2 undergrad degrees and have lived and/or worked in over 20 different countries. I tend to work in the Third World most of the time and would like to settle down somewhere that I can climb, hunt and train pointing dogs. I just want to know that even if times are tuff the "city" has enough job opportunity that I could get a job doing something(anything) to keep me afloat while I am working on a new stateside career.

If you want to hunt as well as climb ice and rock you should look into Bozeman MT. It's pricey as hell and the job market is tough, but its a pretty damn cool town.

Actual major city, the only answer is really SLC and possibly Denver. Lots of climbing locally, lots more available for weekend trips. Cheap as hell to live there, and decent job market to boot. I moved there for the exact same reason as you are considering, though I do not ice climb.

If you change the parameters to "large town" of 40k or more, then that does open things up somewhat.

Livingston has no job opportunities locally. No real rock climbing. When I first moved there it was population 4000 and now add 3000 meth dealers to that #. The local and county government is corrupt as hell and in competition with each other. There is usually a 4th of July Float satiring this Livingston is also the windiest city in MT which people are usually unaware of... Oh and no single women I have left there and do miss the flyfishing, YNP and other things, but it is not survivable there in this economy and I do want decent rock climbing nearby.

I wish I could live in Ouray, but no bird hunting in CO.

I am currently in Austin and loving it and the rock climbing and women here has me spoiled, but this is NOT THE PLACE. So, I need to find The Place soon.

Livingston has no job opportunities locally. No real rock climbing. When I first moved there it was population 4000 and now add 3000 meth dealers to that #. The local and county government is corrupt as hell and in competition with each other. There is usually a 4th of July Float satiring this Livingston is also the windiest city in MT which people are usually unaware of... Oh and no single women I have left there and do miss the flyfishing, YNP and other things, but it is not survivable there in this economy and I do want decent rock climbing nearby.

I wish I could live in Ouray, but no bird hunting in CO.

I am currently in Austin and loving it and the rock climbing and women here has me spoiled, but this is THE PLACE. So, I need to find The Place soon.

Sorry,,,,Typical I mistyped as Austin is NOT the place. There is no public land here. Texas is famous for having very little public land (range wars) its all private, so if you do not own land you are SOL. That was what was wonderful about MT lots of public lands to run dogs and go get lost in. Austin has climbing on the Green Belt in town within a short drive from anywhere in town west of I-35 which is awesome as you can get on the rock everyday. We often start at 6:30pm and switch on the headlamps or work lights and climb till 10pm. Austin is very expensive to live here and the housing rate is 100% occupancy, so rent is high and hard to find housing. Austin was great before the DotCom and HiTech boom hit here.

I guess I will start looking at places like Durango and Salt Lake City. I just figured there were many city/town's in the 40K-100k populaces near some prime rock and ice.

OK, I am wanting to find a "city" not a town, but a city with lots of job opportunity that is VERY near LOTS of both great ice and rock climbing. Suggestions?

What's your education/work experience like?

I have 2 undergrad degrees and have lived and/or worked in over 20 different countries. I tend to work in the Third World most of the time and would like to settle down somewhere that I can climb, hunt and train pointing dogs. I just want to know that even if times are tuff the "city" has enough job opportunity that I could get a job doing something(anything) to keep me afloat while I am working on a new stateside career.

If you want to hunt as well as climb ice and rock you should look into Bozeman MT. It's pricey as hell and the job market is tough, but its a pretty damn cool town.

OK, I am wanting to find a "city" not a town, but a city with lots of job opportunity that is VERY near LOTS of both great ice and rock climbing. Suggestions?

What's your education/work experience like?

I have 2 undergrad degrees and have lived and/or worked in over 20 different countries. I tend to work in the Third World most of the time and would like to settle down somewhere that I can climb, hunt and train pointing dogs. I just want to know that even if times are tuff the "city" has enough job opportunity that I could get a job doing something(anything) to keep me afloat while I am working on a new stateside career.

If you want to hunt as well as climb ice and rock you should look into Bozeman MT. It's pricey as hell and the job market is tough, but its a pretty damn cool town.

Bozeman sucks. Really, don't move here.

No, Bozo is great... just expensive real estate and limited job opportunities. I miss going to the weekly Blue Grass Jams at the Leaf and Bean and at the Co-Op. Hyalite is gorgeous. Getting to jump on Gibson guitars right out of the factory at Music Villa... I love Bozeman, just can't figure out how to make it work there.

I hope y'all have won over the Parks guys for better access to Hyalite, last I heard they were gonna keep the gates locked and stop the vehicles and snowmachines to keep the area cross country skiers only....?

If you want to hunt why move to the city? If all you want is work and tons of ice and rock and a real city Boston might be the ticket? Not sure about the hunting part but there are a lot of good climbers that come out of boston. It is a short shot up 93 to lots of ice and rock. Mark Synot once explained that the reason he lives in N conway NH instead of out west was simple. there is more ice within 40 min of my house than in the the whole state of CO .

I think that might be a bit more accurate if he said 2 hrs from N conway but still highlights the fact that north eastern ice is good.